Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Shimon Peres, one of the original founding fathers of Israel died yesterday at 93 after a massive stroke. For many Israelis, he was the final link between the founders who created the miracle of Israel and the present day.

There's a lot that could be said about Shimon Peres. He was a key aide of Ben-Gurion's and played a major part in wheeling and dealing to get the Haganah arms during Israel's War of Independence in1948, when the world, after recognizing Israel as a state pretty much turned their back on the Jews in the face of Arab jihad less than three years after Auschwitz was liberated. While the Arabs received modern arms and in the case of Jordan, trained officers from Britain to lead to lead the Arabs in their planned annihilation of the Jews of Israel, most nations placed an arms embargo on the nascent Jewish State in the name of 'neutrality' including the United States.

Peres found enough ways around that (with the assistance of a number of sympathetic souls around the globe, some of whose names would surprise you) to get enough arms and ammo into Israel so that with G-d's help Israel survived.

It's never ceased to amuse me that the first major shipment of arms to Israel were Nazi arms manufactured in Czechoslovakia that Peres bought on the black market.

There is plenty more you can read elsewhere about his career. A socialist kibbutznik (he helped found Kibbutz Alumot) he remained a man of the left his entire life. He served time in Israel's government as defense minister, where he was instrumental in establishing close relations with France that led to massive arms deals to help Israel keep its edge over the enemies that surrounded it. The French thought so highly of Peres that they awarded him the Legion D' Honor.

He served as Prime Minister twice, but was never actually elected, leading to one of those wonderfully acerbic Israeli political jokes I needn't mention here. Eventually, he served as Israel's President, a largely ceremonial role that he performed with distinction.

Yes, there are other things that could be said about Shimon Peres that aren't so complimentary, and I think a lot of Israelis know exactly what I'm talking about.

But this isn't the time or place for that, not today. Today, we honor one of Israel's pioneers, a man who helped create a nation for the Jewish People.

Rest in peace Shimon (Z"L). And may your memory be blessed for the good you accomplished.

The U.S. congress with strong bi-partisan majorities overrode President Obama's veto of a bill that allows the families of American victims of terrorism to sue states that sponsor terrorist attacks. The catalyst behind the legislation was new evidence about Saudi complicity in the 9/11 attacks, and the bill would allow victims of those who were murdered sue the government of Saudi Arabia. Iran is also a likely target.

The vote in the senate was 97-1, and was led by Chuck Schumer(D-NY) who made an impassioned speech urging his fellow Democrats to vote to veto the bill. The one holdout was Harry Reid (D-Nevada)who is retiring from the Senate this year with his ill-gotten gains intact and a reputation of being the worst, most divisive Senate Majority leader in history. Vice presidential candidate Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) chose to skip out on the voting even though he was in town. Given his Muslim Brotherhood ties, I'm not surprised.

In the house, the vote was 348 to 77.

The argument against the bill was that it would allow other countries to retaliate and sue us. At a time when Iran is kidnapping hostages and holding them for ransom, that argument holds little water. And when it comes to the Saudis, Qatar and other nations in the region, they need us a lot more than we need them.

This is the first time President Barack Hussein Obama has ever been overruled.

I actually live blogged the whole thing (yes, once again I watch this stuff so you don't have too) but this was such a travesty I'll just go over the main points.

The minute Hillary walked out with that manic smile, my comment at 6:06 PM (all times PST) was 'boy, did they shoot her full of drugs.' I'm not kidding in the least. I know a bit about such things. I'd guess B-12 combined with a Dexedrine cocktail, perhaps with some cortisone shots to keep her knees from buckling for 90 minutes. They'll play hell trying to get her to sleep tonight without the aid of some serious downers like Seconal.

Expect her to be out of action for a few days.

Another thing I noticed (and I wasn't the only one) was how over prepared she was, with each answer spilling on without so much as an um or an err. After the third time this happened, I understood. She'd gotten the questions in advance from Lester Holt, who composed them, and had then spent serious time rehearsing. It was like watching
one of those old 'pull the ring and she talks' dolls.

As for Lester Holt, performed exactly as I said he would. Anyone watching the debates understood instantly that this was Holt and Hillary against the Donald.

His questions were pretty much out of the Clinton playbook worded in leftist prose about 'income inequality' 'climate change' and 'racial justice', with aggressive interrogations by Holt on Trump's tax returns, Trump's 'racist birtherism' Trump's business bankruptcies and other tidbits. I especially liked the one where he framed Clinton's tax plans as 'Mrs. Clinton wants to tax the wealthy, and you want to lower taxes on the wealthy.' Actually Trump's plan is for an across the board tax cut and he did a decent job explaining it once he was able to get past Holt's constant interruptions and snide comments. Actually, Holt interrupted Trump 58% more than he interrupted Hillary Clinton.

Funny thing, Lester Holt had no questions about Benghazi, the Clinton Foundation or Hillary's e-mail scandal and her illegal private server. Even though one of his questions concerned cyber security, there were no followup questions on that little item! Lester Holt had indeed learned not to go there after what happened to Matt Lauer! The only mention was a comeback by Trump, who said he'd release his taxes when Mrs. Clinton released the 32,000 e-mails she deleted. It got a huge ovation from the audience which Lester Holt shushed as soon as he could. On the other hand, any applause for Mrs. Clinton was allowed to continue.

The only problem from Hillary's standpoint with Lester Holt's blatant partisan approach is that he overplayed his hand.He was so obvious about the whole thing that he actually helped Trump, who was perceived as the underdog fighting back against as rigged system, which has been one of Trump's campaign themes. Here was living proof, right in front of everyone. Social media is on fire about this.

Viewer polls from Time Magazine, Drudge and even CNBC showed Trump winning the debate handily and they weren't the only ones. Even Slate showed Trump winning. Needless to say, as I predicted the legacy media is already trying to spin this as a Clinton win, but it's going to be very difficult:

People might forget what you say, but never how you made them feel. Based on that, Trump won handily.

Of course, the 'fact checking' will go on. For instance, Trump was also entirely correct when he said murders had increased in 2016 in spite of the in the tank Politifact's efforts to lie about it. Talk about pants on fire!

Expect a lot more of this. But people simply aren't fooled by the Clinton media as easily as they used to be.

Mrs. Clinton also did herself no favors ranting on about the 'incipient racism' in white society and especially among the police. I guess even when a black cop shoots a black man coming at him with a gun after being told repeatedly to drop his weapon, that's white racism too.

Trump also scored because of his obviously superior knowledge of how business and economics works and with a little exchange he had with Lester Holt about Stop and Frisk. When Holt stated incorrectly that it was 'unconstitutional,' Trump correctly replied that this was a ruling from one judge who was actually removed from the case and that New York's cop hating Mayor De Blasio had chosen to quash what would have likely been a successful appeal.

Trump did make one error I need to mention and he's not the only one. Barack Obama might brag about ending the Iraq War and people may talk about the vacuum this created but both are dead wrong. George W.Bush was the man who signed the disposition of forces agreement with Iraqi leader al-Maliki which called for all U.S. forces to be withdrawn from the Shi'ite dictatorship Bush created there, one of the stupidest things an American president has ever done. It laid the groundwork for Iran to flourish without the checkmate of Saddam Hussein's army right across the Gulf. But Obama can take no credit of blame for pulling our troops out of Iraq.

Of course Obama and Hillary can definitely be charged with having a major role in creating ISIS (which started in Syria as jihadist elements of the Syrian Free Army Obama funded armed and trained, not in Iraq) and destabilizing the entire Middle East with his illegal war in Libya, but that's a different question.

Again, this wasn't even a semblance of a debate. In a real debate, one of the participants can say the moon is made of green cheese and it's not the moderator's job to 'fact check' the speaker but but her opponent's to rebut her. Especially when the 'fact checking' is done in advance and aimed at one candidate and one only.

A final takeaway has to do with the overall demeanor of the candidates. As I predicted both Hillary and her minion Lester Holt tried their best to insult, demean and bait trump hoping to make him lose his cool. He refused to rise to the bait and kept things civil, which surprised a lot of people. He looked presidential compared to Mrs. Clinton's genuinely smug, nasty demeanor. The only time he really let fly a little is when Mrs. Clinton started bragging about her experience and Trump countered by saying something to the effect that it was all bad experience and failure, which again got an ovation Holt did his best to shush.

I honestly don't think Trump realized the extent the media was prepared to go to to try and take him down. They failed, but the Donald is a quick learner. And yes, Trump made a decision to avoid landing what could have been knockout blows in favor of appearing more likeable and presidential. For instance, when Hillary and Lester Holt were painting him as a sexist, it would have been no trouble at all for him to start referring to Hillary's sexual predator of a husband and Hillary's enabling of it. But as Trump tells it, he saw Chelsea in the audience and decided to let it pass because he felt it wasn't the right thing to do. Like Hillary's corruption and weakness on cyber security, most people already know this anyway, so I think that was a smart decision on his part first time out.

Trump fooled me too on this one. At times, I was like Bundini or Angelo Dundee, yelling 'Champ! Get off the ropes! Don't let them pound you like that, mention the Clinton Foundation!'

But like Mohammed Ali, The Donald chose to hold some of his fire and let Crooked Hillary and her media shill beat themselves, rope a dope style. Smart move, and expect him to be even more impressive next time out.

Monday, September 26, 2016

It's definitely on tonight, and while we can't predict exactly how it will go, here are some things I'm pretty sure you can take for granted:

You'll frequently be under the impression Trump is debating 'moderator' Lester Holt rather than Mrs. Clinton.

Matt Lauer was the moderator of the Commander in Chief forum and Lester Holt had to have noticed the gang stomping Matt Lauer got from his peers as well as his employer simply for asking Mrs. Clinton a few questions about her e-mail scandal. It didn't matter that this was something obviously relevant in a forum on national security. Not only did he make her look bad, but he actually had a semblance of fairness when questioning Donald Trump.

No matter how this comes out, Hillary Clinton will be extolled as the Winner by the media afterwards.

Donald Trump, you see, will actually be going three on one here against Mrs. Clinton, the media and the moderator. Unless it's a major blowout, they will call it for Clinton and manipulate the polls to do their best to 'prove' she won.

Expect a fair amount of attempts to insult Trump and get him to lose his cool. 'Nuff said.

Expect the debate rules to be broken if it favors Mrs. Clinton regardless of the rules. If she has one of her infamous coughing fits, expect Lester Holt to go to a station break or commercial, Expect him to allow her to filibuster and not answer questions whenever its remotely possible without being challenged. Expect her to be allowed to try to talk over Trump without being restrained by the 'moderator.'

And expect the exact opposite treatment for Donald Trump.

And unless there's a major gotcha moment, expect this debate to have little impact on the election.

After a long negotiation, Benyamin Netanyahu signed a new MOU with President Barack Hussein Obama on a military aid package for U.S. military aid to Israel over the next ten years.

While it was touted as 'an unprecedented increase it military aid' to Israel, in reality, it was a decrease, and one with stringent and dangerous conditions that Netanyahu should have rejected outright.

Before we get to the details, let me dispose of some nonsense coming from figures on the Israeli left like Israel's former Labor Prime Minister, Ehud Barak, that Israel would have gotten a better deal if Netanyahu hadn't opposed Obama's Iran deal and made that 2015 speech to a joint session of Congress to try and head it off.

President Obama has made it clear from the beginning of his presidency that he loathes Israel and wanted to 'create distance' between the U.S. and Israel to appease the Muslim world. End of story.

Nothing Netanyahu could have done short of surrendering to all of Obama's demands, creating 500,000 Jewish refugees and moving Israel to unsafe borders would have changed that, and President Obama would still have insisted on appeasing Iran with farcical Iran deal whether Netanyahu had stayed home and kept his mouth shut or not. Providing billions of dollars to Israel's most genocidal enemy and giving them a clear path to nuclear weapons was something Obama was always going to do, just like his efforts to empower Islamists in the region that ended up destabilizing the Middle East was always something he was going to do.That, of course is one huge reason for rejecting the agreement. The Israelis should never have taken seriously any offer coming from President Obama, let alone signed on. This was just a convenient political smokescreen in an election year designed to appear to counteract Obama's progress in making U.S. support for Israel a partisan issue, and what will likely be a U.S. abstention or perhaps even a vote in favor of a biased UN resolution. That resolution will be written to abrogate U.S. signed treaties like the Road Map and Oslo which call for direct negotiations between Israel and PLO and substitute a UN diktat, gifting the Palestinian Authority everything it wants without negotiating anything, at least on paper. And yes, Barack Hussein Obama was always going to do that eventually too, when the opportunity arose, in this case after the 2016 elections. He is simply not to be trusted in any regard where Israel is concerned and neither is the current Democrat nominee, Mrs. Clinton. To be sure, such a UN resolution would never be accepted by the Israelis, but it would provide additional strain on the U.S.-Israel relationship, something President Barack Hussein Obama has had as a policy goal since he took office.

Netanyahu accepted this for a couple of reasons, both political rather than strategic. He didn't want to face political pressure at home for 'ruining the relationship with America' (the Israeli press has its strident leftists, just like America) and he was likely hoping to throw a bone to Obama in hopes he could mollify him during his last few months in office. So at best, this new agreement was a calculated risk, but we'll see.

So that disposed of, let's look at the deal itself. It allocates $3.8 billion a year in military aid to Israel for a period of ten years, up from $3.1 billion per year. That's an increase of $700 million dollars per year, but it's not the increase it would seem to be. For one thing, arms costs have risen by between 20-25% since the last U.S./Israel arms agreement was signed. Subtract that percentage from the new the new amount, and you'll see it amounts to hardly any increase at all, and will likely even be a substantial decrease in ten years. This is especially relevant because this agreement forbids Israel from asking for more, no matter what. It also takes congress out of the equation, where Israel's real friends live and puts this in the hands of the White House.

This amount also includes funds for Israel's missile defense. which Congress funded separately as an additional appropriation of approximately $500 million on an annual basis. So this actually amounts to another cut in this supposed 'increase' in aid. This is especially bad in view of the fact that Congress had already decided to appropriate $3.4 billion of regular foreign aid, plus an additional $600 million for missile defense in 2017, or $4 billion in total. Obama, of course would never have signed off on that but at least it should have been a starting point, especially since Obama and Secretary of state John Kerry promised Israel 'unprecedented aid' after shoving through the Iran deal.

This ain't that, not by a long shot.

The only provision for any increase at all would be if Israel is involved in a war. That decision on whether Israel is at war would be dependent on President Obama or perhaps (G-d forbid) a President Clinton, herself no fan of Israel. Remember than President Obama was the only U.S, president since Israel became a U.S. ally to actually cut off arms shipments to Israel during a shooting war. This part of the deal actually legitimizes that kind of action.

Then there are the various other restrictions. Right now, Israel is allowed to spend 25% of the aid it receives in Israel with Israeli defense companies, while 75% must be spent in the U.S. That restriction, by the way, is unique to Israel. Here's just one example. Egypt receives $1.5 billion in military aid from the U.S. every year. They can spend it however and wherever they choose. After the breach between Obama and the al-Sissi government over Obama's pique over the removal of the president's Muslim Brotherhood favorite Mohammed Morsi from power, Egypt got its $1.5 billion after some song and dance. But the arms they bought with it were Russian.

The new deal mandates that 100% of U.S. aid to Israel be spent in the U.S. in the final five years of the proposed deal. Ironically, the 25% Israel now spends with Israeli defense companies like Rafael actually benefits the U.S. because it usually ends up being used for R&D, something that has produced a number of products that benefits our military like the unique light weight super strong helmet that has become standard issue for our troops.

There's another even more insidious problem with this. What if a future U.S. president for whatever reason decides not to sell arms to Israel any more? The most crucial need in a modern military to keep it up and running, especially in wartime is spare parts - airplane tires, nuts and bolts, engine parts, tank treads, electronics, repair kits, things like that. In 1967, France's Charles DeGaulle, who had been Israel's chief arms supplier decided to curry favor with the Arab world by suddenly cutting off all arms shipments to Israel on the eve of the Six-Day-War, even shipments Israel had already paid for. One of the miracles of the Six -Day-War is that it only took six days...had it lasted much longer, Israel would have had crucial problems finding spare parts. This new deal has that same risk built into it.

Rather than accept what Obama offered, perhaps Israel should have held out not for more money but for the ability to spend what it gets where it wants just like a lot of other countries do. Foreign aid totals about 1% of the U.S budget. The aid Israel will get under this new deal is less than 20% of it's overall defense budget and while that's not insignificant, it isn't overwhelming either.

Israel might be far better off not receiving these funds and charging the U.S. the going rate for those services it provides like other countries do. The going price for hosting America's Middle East Strategic arms depot per year alone would provide Israel with as much or possibly more money than this aid package does based on what similar bases cost us. They could then invest that in Israeli companies to enable Israel to become self sufficient in building their own weaponry without the necessity of depending on a foreign country for spare parts or shipments of armaments at crucial times. A few years ago, this wouldn't have been a problem but post-Obama and with the creation of Israel as a partisan issue for the Democrats, it is now.

If Israel is going to accept the funds, it should spend as much as possible on machinery and technology for its domestic arms companies that will eventually enable this kind of self-sufficiency.

Seeing how the first truly anti-Israel president in history has behaved, Israel needs to learn the lesson that a client state status has its risks. Things change. While there's an excellent chance the relationship between Israel and America would be vastly improved with Donald Trump and Mike Pence in office, it's far better to take precautions and opt for self sufficiency and independence, just in case.

The Donald in action in Roanoke, Virginia 9/24/16 before a sell out crowd of 20,000 plus...along with a crowd outside watching and listening on monitors outside the event who couldn't get in.

The difference in the level of energy between Trump's massive events and the small crowds Hillary Clinton is attracting to her own rare events is astounding. And Trump has been averaging two a day of these, sometimes in widely disparate locations.

Friday night brought us a new atrocity as five people at the Cascade Mall in Burlington, Washington were murdered. The mall, of course is a gun free zone, so no one was able to stop the carnage. The killer targeted women - 'uncovered women' - in the local Macy's around the cosmetics counter while shouting something while pulling the trigger.

I think we know what he was shouting.

At first the media was saying that the killer was 'Hispanic' but eventually the truth cam out. He was Arcan Cetin, a 20-year-old Turkish Muslim who lived in nearby Oak Harbor, a legal permanent resident of the U.S.

He gunned down four women and one man, including, reportedly, his ex-girlfriend and her grandmother. This might have been an honor killing.

The police say that Cetin cased the area before going back out to get his gun,which he may have obtained illegally.

He's a real prince. Skagit County court records show three domestic-violence assault charges against Cetin. The victim was identified as Cetin's stepfather. He also has an arrest for drunk driving on his record.

Thanks Obama! Just the kind of person we need to bring into America.

Oh, yes, one more thing...a Hillary supporter, just in case the media tries to pretend otherwise.

The point of all this is while this might not be terrorism, it is definitely a reflection of Islam's misogynist culture. And that culture doesn't mix well with a free society. All we have to do is look at how importing this culture has worked out for Europe.

I can't imagine why any young woman in her right mind would vote for Hillary Clinton, who wants to import boatloads of people with this culture to America and make life for women a lot more dangerous.

Friday, September 23, 2016

According to various sources including some close to the Trump campaign, Ted Cruz is in what is being described as final talks on the logistics of a coming endorsement by Cruz of Donald Trump.

It could happen as early as Monday, before the debate.

This is fairly credible for one simple reason...Ted Cruz has finally realized the extent of the serious damage he did to his own future political prospects by his behavior at the 2016 GOP convention and his failure to honor the pledge he and other contestants made to endorse the eventual nominee, which was Donald Trump.

As I reported here, even many of Cruz's supporters at the convention went ballistic over Cruz's failure to endorse Trump.

That fallout continued after the convention. Last month, a poll showed that 43 percent of Texas Republicans wanted a different 2018 Senate nominee, with former Gov. Rick Perry getting a majority if he ran against Cruz in the primary. George P. Bush, the state's elected land commissioner and a popular figure in the state broke with Ted Cruz and his own family last month and heartily endorsed Donald Trump. And just a week ago, Cruz's own; campaign chairman in Texas, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick blasted Cruz by name and 'NeverTrumpers' in general for not getting on board, accusing them of helping Hillary Clinton get elected.

The final straw was RNC chairman Reince Pribus announcing that former primary challengers who’ve refused to support Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump are likely to face difficulties getting the RNC to allow them to make another run for president.

I have a feeling that really got Ted Cruz's attention.

So, if this comes off, what difference will it make? It might have made a large difference if Cruz had kept his word and endorsed Trump at the convention, especially if he did what Scott Walker's doing and actually campaigned for Trump. That would have meant a far more unified Republican party going in, because it would have delegitimized a large portion of the #nevertrumpers. Now,the differences are going to be fairly minimal.

The #nevertrumper stance is fairly dug in, particularly among the paid for punditocracy and the GOP establishment. They like the idea of Hillary winning, because it means business as usual for them.

Polls show that Trump, without Cruz's endorsement, has the support of 80% of likely Republican voters, while Mrs. Clinton has the support of 81%. There are no polls showing how many Democrats are crossing over to vote Trump and vice versa for Mrs. Clinton, but based on the state poll numbers as well as Trumps inroads into the Latino and black vote, it's fairly easy to extrapolate those numbers going Trump's way, especially when you realize that Trump has energized a lot of people who haven't voted in some time and aren't likely voters. Many of the pollsters have mentioned this and it's driving them nuts.

So overall, a Cruz endorsement could add a couple of points to Trump's numbers in some places, if that. It certainly won't stop the attacks on Trump from the usual 'conservative' suspects, but then a lot of us stopped caring about what they had to say a long time ago.

But the real beneficiary, of course, isn't Donald Trump but Ted Cruz. If he endorses Donald Trump and then simply sits the campaign out, he can make another run for the presidency, if he manages to survive being primaried in Texas. That, my friends is exactly why Cruz is coming out with this last minute endorsement.

Here's hoping Trump didn't promise him a position in the Trump administration for this gesture. Ted Cruz has already proven amply that he's no team player and that his word isn't worth much.

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

Violent protests spearheaded by the BlackLivesMatter movement broke out in Charlotte, North Carolina last night.

The rioters (I'm not going to call them 'protestors', thank you) shut down I-85 and had a jolly time throwing rocks down on motorists from overpasses, which resulted in a number of accidents and 85 people being injured. Lots of videos at the link showing the mob cheering every time they hit a car.

They eventually set fire to the freeway and got busy breaking into trucks":

Then they moved on to a Wal-Mart on N. Tryon in the University area to loot and pick up some more goodies as part of the night's festivities. That store was closed today, with wooden pallets piled in front of the doors and shopping carts blocking the driveway into the lot. Anyone want to bet it doesn't reopen and takes a lot of badly needed jobs away when it closes its doors?

Something like a dozen police officers have been hurt today as the riots continue.

Charlotte has a white, uber-progressive Democrat female mayor in Jennifer Roberts who got elected by a very narrow margin and depends on the black vote to stay in office. So it's reasonable to imagine that she's followed the example of the mayor of Baltimore in ordering the police to make a minimum of arrests, sit there and take it and allow part of the city to be destroyed in the interest of 'peace.'

And in fact, there have been very few arrests made.

So, what was this all about?

Keith Lamont Scott, 43 was sitting in a parked car in the parking lot of a University City apartment complex. Three police officers approached him, one in plain clothes and two in uniform.

Police said they had been searching for someone who had an outstanding warrant at College Downs complex on Old Concord Road when they saw Scott leave his car holding a gun.

The police approached the car, Scott exited the car again armed with a firearm “and posed an imminent deadly threat to the officers, who subsequently fired their weapon striking the subject,” police said in a statement. “The officers immediately requested Medic and began performing CPR.”

The officer who fired the fatal shot was CMPD Officer Brentley Vinson, who is black.

A woman who said she is Scott’s daughter claimed on a live-streamed video on Facebook that Scott was unarmed when he was shot. The video went viral, with more than 521,000 views by 9:30 p.m.

In the video, the woman said her father was sitting in his car reading a book and waiting for the school bus to drop off his son. She claimed that her father was Tasered and then shot four times, and that he was disabled.

I think we'll find out later that this part is sheer fantasy. Someone who's been tasered isn't in any condition to pickup a gun.Not only that, but if he was tasered and that didn't subdue him (say, if like Rodney King he was high out of his mind on PCP), the police have been trained in other methods to subdue him.

The police claim that they recovered King's gun but did not recover a book and that they have witnesses and video backing up their version of things. So we'll see.

I'd also like to know what the warrant was for. I have a feeling it wasn't for an overdue traffic ticket.

The police have admitted that Scott was not the person they were looking for, so his death, if their version is correct, was solely due to his being stupid enough to get out of a parked car and advance towards police carrying a gun. If that's the case and Scott was a fan, BlackLivesMatter and their fairy tales might be the real villains responsible for Scott's death.

Meanwhile, Mayor Roberts says she has been in contact with the governor’s office, the White House and the NAACP. So no matter how this goes, expect the Obama DOJ to come down heavy on the Charlotte PD.

Oh, and one more thing. Donald Trump was already ahead in North Carolina, but this ought to seal to deal for him to carry the state come November...especially if Obama or Hillary 'comment.'

On September 16th,Donald Trump became the first presidential candidate ever to visit Miami's Little Haiti community in a town hall setting. If you're moved by Donald Trump in front of a cheering crowd of 20,000 people, just watch him in a small , intimate setting here. Caveat...the video below had some glitches and interference at some very significant points. I'm told it was caused by reporters unplugging their equipment and exiting en masse as soon as some of the speakers stated talking about the Clintons and the Clinton Foundation and how they literally raped Haiti and stole millions of dollars in aid money after the horrendous 2010 earthquake, a story I've covered before.

The vast majority of Haitians both back in Haiti and here in America loathe the Clintons and here's what the community in Little Haiti had to say about that and other subjects to Donald Trump.

The Haitians have largely been a community that resembles some of the European immigrants we took in back in the early part of the twentieth century.As a group they are very much into education, and coming from Haiti, a place where simply making a living is a major test of self-reliance, a number of them have started successful small businesses once they recovered from their shock at the opportunities available in America.

And they'll be voting for Donald Trump. Perhaps when he's president, he really will appoint a special prosecutor and investigate what was done to Haiti by the Clintons. I hope he does.

It takes a special breed of people - and I use the term loosely - to exploit human misery for personal profit the way the Clintons did in Haiti.

Tuesday, September 20, 2016

With Trump now in the lead in North Carolina, you'd think the last thing Hillary Clinton would be doing is canceling a lucrative and badly needed appearance in the Tarheel State.

But CBS reported that Clinton campaign officials said that a Tuesday fundraiser in the Democrat college town enclave of Chapel Hill was 'postponed' indefinitely, without any reason being given.

The fundraiser was billed as “lunch with Hillary Rodham Clinton” and had four donation' levels for attendees. They ranged from $100,000, which featured “chair reception with Hillary,” $33,000, which included a “host reception with Hillary,” $5,000, which included “preferred seating” and $2,700...which, I suppose, allowed you to have her used napkins or something as a keepsake of the happy event.

You'd think the lure of cash would have revived her, but apparently not.

North Carolina isn't just a battleground state with a close race according to the polls. This comes at a time when Donald Trump is surging and Mrs. Clinton badly needed to make an appearance to quell rumors about her failing health that now are looking more like reality. Here she is just two days ago...

trump's Tweet? "Hillary Clinton is taking the day off again, she needs the rest. Sleep well Hillary - see you at the debate!"

Whatever the reason, Trump took full advantage of Hillary's absence. He did events in Kenansville, a small Eastern North Carolina town at the Duplin County Event Center that drew at least 10,000 people...

And followed up with a similar sized rally in High Point:

A pretty excited young college crowd at the High Point rally!

Looks like a lot of people in North Carolina wanted to hear what he had to say, as opposed to a handful of elites at a fundraiser interested in buying access to a corrupt shill.

In some places, Trump is actually outperforming Romney. In Nevada, for example, President Obama ran up a 47-point margin of victory among Hispanic voters in 2012, according to exit polls, defeating Romney 71 percent to 24 percent. A recent Marist poll in the state for NBC News and The Wall Street Journal showed Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton leading among Hispanics, but by the smaller margin of 35 points, 65 percent to 30 percent.

A series of Univision polls earlier this month surveying Hispanic voters in four battleground states — Arizona, Colorado, Florida and Nevada — also put Trump in the same ballpark as Romney four years ago. Clinton’s lead over Trump among Hispanics in Colorado was smaller than Obama’s margin in that state in 2012.

A Bloomberg Politics "poll decoder" on Tuesday averaged several national surveys and found Clinton leading among Hispanics by 38 points. But Obama won the group by six points more in 2012, according to exit polls.

Actually, I think both these numbers for black and Latino numbers supporting Trump are understated. People in many of these communities might say one thing to pollsters and their peers just to go along to get along, but for a surprising number, what happens inside the voting booth is going to be quite different. None of this will be any surprise to people who have actually attended his Yu-uge rallies and seen the diversity of the people whom attend them.

The reason for that is obvious. Trump is talking bread and butter issues to the communities that have been hardest hit by Obama's policies. He's talking jobs to people that desperately need them. He's talking ending illegal migration to people that have to live with the results of increased housing costs, lower wages and diminished prospects. He's talking school choice to people desperate to get their kids out of dysfunctional public schools and better law enforcement to people that have to live with the reality of crack houses, gangs flourishing in their neighborhoods and the ever present danger of their children being murdered as collateral damage in street wars.

What's even more important is that he's going to their neighborhoods and talking directly to these people, not just issuing policy papers and statements. Mitt Romney had the baggage of his LDS faith, an issue for some Catholics and Evangelicals. But what I think really cut his numbers down among blacks and Latinos was that with rare exceptions he ignored them. There were few if any campaign offices in minority neighborhoods, little phone banking or canvassing and definitely very few if any rallies or campaign events,let alone poll watchers. That's why in places like detroit and Philadelphia you had precincts with 120% turnout and not a single recorded Romney vote.

Trump is doing exactly the opposite, and it's going to show up to a surprising degree on election day.

Fun fact: there's an organized campaign to get bigoted Trump hater Jorge Ramos removed from his slot as a news anchor at UniVison. And while Brent Bozell is heading it, the campaign is being driven by Latino journalists and public figures.

Whore Hay won't be leaving, of course but the very fact that his nonsense is being increasingly recognized is unprecedented.

Monday, September 19, 2016

Some of you might remember the Steubenville, Ohio rape case, where an underage girl who was drugged and unconscious was gang raped. A video of the rape went viral, complete with some of the party goers laughing hysterically over her being 'so raped' and 'dead.'

The story is also notable because the perpetrators, or at least the two we know about were members of the popular high school football team and there was an effort at a coverup by the school because of that.

The two football players, Trent Mays and Ma'lik Richmond,pictured above were only convicted because of the efforts of hacker Deric Losutter, who hacked into the Steubenville High School sports fan website and revealed incriminating evidence against two rapists and three others who may or may not have also participated and kept silent except for swapping obscene Instagram comments among themselves along the lines of ''no pity for whores' and how 'some whores deserve to be p*ssed on.'

Faced with also being prosecuted, the other three were given immunity to testify.

The duo's lawyer, one Walter Madison actually tried to make the case this was consensual because "She didn't affirmatively say no."

"The person who is the accuser here is silent just as she was that night, and that's because there was consent," he said.

Of course, as the judge pointed out, consent wasn't an issue since the girl was a minor and others testified that she was unconscious while all this was going on. But then, most defense lawyers usually aren't burdened much with morals and ethics...let alone concerned with the truth unless it provides a loophole of escape for their clients.

Richmond and Mays were convicted of the rape of a minor, but aside from some harsh words from the judge, nothing really happened to the two rapists. Ma'lik Richmond was back to playing football for Steubenville just a few days after serving only 10 months out of a one-year sentence in a juvenile detention facility. And Trent Mays spent just two years behind bars for the rape, but that didn't stop him from getting admitted to Ohio’s Hocking College and playing varsity college football there.

The real criminal, the one who felt the full force of the law on his back? Deric Losutter, the one the actually unearthed the evidence that convicted the rapists and got the others to plea bargain. The FBI raided Lostutter’s home and, then arrested and indicted him on four counts: three counts of unauthorized access to a computer used for privacy breach and one count of making a false statement to the FBI.

He's facing 16 years in prison. Lostutter’s lawyer, Tor Ekeland, says that the harsh sentence is based on the 1986 the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, or CFAA. It was originally only supposed to cover actual criminal activity, but it's been extended out of all proportion from its original intent and beefed up quite a bit, perhaps as a lesson to the activities of whistleblowers and the WikiLeaks phenomenon.

Yes, Losutter apparently had some involvement with Anonymous, a group for which I admittedly don't have too much sympathy for reasons I needn't go into. But one of the primary object of criminal justice used to be to determine who had been harmed.

Now, we've it seems we're returning to an earlier time, when justice is doled out unequally as a given, and a primary objective is simply to serve as an example pour encourager les autres, a warning to keep the peasants in line.

Can we blame this on the regime of President Obama? Of course we can. It's under his administration, particularly at the Federal level that the idea of justice being politicized and perverted depending on who it's aimed at has taken off on steroids.

Every week on Monday, the WoW! community and our invited guests weigh in at the WoW!Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question: Can America Unite Again?

Stately McDaniel Manor: One of the favorite tricks of defense lawyers is the “anything’s possible” ploy. They get a witness, often a police officer, to admit the wildest, most improbable happenstances are at least possible, and juries sometimes buy it, letting their guilty-as-sin clients walk. The truth is, everything/anything is not possible. Monkeys will never fly from my posterior. A billion dollars will never fall from the sky and land, intact, at my feet. I will never be 25 again, and I will never become a Hollywood starlet. But for the purposes of this forum, I’ll play defense attorney and stipulate it is possible America might once again be united.

Now let’s get real and consider why it’s more likely that’s impossible.

It is possible for all Americans to be united, one people, if they are taught the importance of that philosophy and practice. If, having been taught it, they believe it, and are willing to make adjustments in their thinking, manner of living, and manner of speaking to practice it in their daily lives, the possibility of the term “American” meaning more than just “one born in or naturalized in America,” exists. This state of affairs can thrive only if being American is unique, special, worth fighting and dying for, worth defending in every way and at every level, and superior in every way to tribalism, religion, ideology and party. It’s possible only if liberty yet burns in American breasts.

For around half of the residents of the American continent, that is no longer true. It hasn’t been for many years, and the Age of Obama has all but ended the possibility of American unity. This has been the probable turning point of the progressive determination to fundamentally transform America in their deranged, tyrannical image.

They have had near complete success.

Progressives now own--in control over philosophy and curriculum--much of America’s public school system. They own much of the popular culture, and virtually all of the so-called publically funded, and not a little of the private, higher education systems. With a few notable exceptions, they also own the media. The permanent federal bureaucracy is theirs, and so too is most of the federal judiciary at all levels. They are one justice away from complete control of the Supreme Court.

Under Barack Obama, they succeeded in all but eliminating the separation of powers, and have rendered the Constitution essentially meaningless in significant ways. Their destruction of the rule of law, and the trust of the people in the rule of law and government in general has been considerable, but not yet absolute. Our allies despise and mistrust us and our deadly enemies laugh at and have no fear of us.

It has often been said that progressives, hating the American people, have always wanted to throw us out and elect another. They are close to accomplishing that goal, having thrown wide our national borders with no concern for who enters, excepting they be highly likely to vote for Democrats. In fact, Progressives are determined to import hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Muslims, people whose allegiance is to Islam, then their tribe, and perhaps somewhere, far, far down on the list, America. It is an inherent part of the Progressive project to seek “diversity,” which by definition must mean the end of American unity. Demanding that immigrants have useful skills or trades, the ability to be contributing members of society rather than become eternal drags on the public treasury, that they become proficient in English, that they adapt to American customs and laws, that they abandon barbaric practices like female genital mutilation and honor killing of female relatives, and they not be vicious drug users and/or criminals, is anathema to progressives who see such traditional expectations as nativist and intolerant or counter-diversity.

They admit hundreds, if not thousands, of immigrants will be terrorists. So what? What you gonna do about it Gun and God clinger?

The sheer numbers of non-assimilating foreigners have another, more important purpose for progressives: to make a permanent democrat voting majority, to ensure none but hand picked progressive candidates will ever hold the White House. It’s working. Even now, with hundreds of thousands per year pouring over our borders, Republicans have an uphill struggle for federal office. A level playing field disappeared decades ago.

But it is not only in immigration that progressives separate themselves from their fellow citizens. We are, do not forget, a huge basket of deplorables, God and gun clingers, haters of all not like us, and our betters have a duty to remake America into Venezuela, though that won’t happen because they are so smart every Marxist/socialist pipe dream will work--this time--for the first time in history.

And what of Congressional Republicans? Most are RINOs. They have the backbones of squid and the cohesive courage of turtles. Some make noises about the Constitution and the rule of law, but no matter how many houses of Congress they control, they accomplish virtually nothing and the inexorable Progressive march continues, leaving Americans to vote for people like John McCain in the vain hope having someone in office with an “R” after their name will be somehow hopeful. If Donald Trump wins and they control both houses of Congress, it’s highly doubtful they’ll be able to do so much as repeal Obamacare. If Hillary Clinton wins, and they still control both houses of Congress, they’ll do worse than they did under Barack Obama. Obama set the tone and tactics; Hillary will extend them and run wild. She has promised as much.

Will America once again be a united nation? With half--and growing--of the population determined that it not be so? With the federal courts ruling requiting proof of citizenship to vote is unconstitutional? But hey, anything’s possible, right?

Laura Rambeau Lee, Right Reason : In my heart I firmly believe America can unite again. The divisions we see in America have not come from the people. Division is a weapon used by the political elites along with a complicit media and educational system to maintain power. It is a successful formula: Create an aggrieved group and an oppressor and then promise justice. The challenge is for we as Americans to come together as we have in the past to speak the truth and call out these liars and their lies.

We can be united by restoring the rule of law and making sure the laws are applied equally to all regardless of race, background or gender. We also must make English the official language in America. We cannot be united without sharing a common language. We spend too much time and money accommodating those who live here, even become citizens, who refuse to learn English. They can keep their mother tongue and speak it in their homes, but to get on in our society everyone must learn to read, write and communicate in English. We all come from different backgrounds and ethnicities. Many of us still embrace some of the customs from our ancestors whether religious or cultural. But we have united as Americans and understand that the precious freedoms we have here do not exist anywhere else in the world. Unfortunately we are at a point in our history where we can lose these freedoms if we allow our fundamental rights to be eroded and abolished.

The progressive agenda of multiculturalism must be challenged at every turn, particularly with our children who are being immersed and indoctrinated at very early ages. There is nothing wrong with instilling in our children the exceptional values and traditions of our American history and culture. In fact we should be doing more of this in our schools, explaining the foundational principles of individual rights and freedoms enshrined in our Constitution.

Americans can be united again but it will not happen if we remain silent and allow this divisiveness to continue. It really is up to we the people and I do believe there are more of us than those who seek to divide and destroy this great country.

JoshuaPundit: I think unity...or at least a resurgence of the amount of unity we had in say, the mid 20th century- is entirely possible.The Trump revolution and to a lesser degree the Bernie revolution might be contradictory in which end of the telescope they see things through, but their impetus is the same...a reaction against the self-appointed elites plundering and destroying our country. That's an incredibly hopeful sign, and an indication of how what we'll call the uniparty has misjudged how angry the peasants are. And I don't think the numbers are 50-50 when you come down to it, and in some surprising areas.

The factors behind our present malaise are these:

Abysmal, corrupt leadership- The last three presidents are the worst in our history, and they were all two termers. We're talking about a quarter century of decline that worked out just fine for the elites or those entrepreneurs smart enough to surf the waves and make money out of it, but rather poorly for the rest of us. The amount of blood and treasure squandered for no purpose except the enrichment of the few (Including those in positions of authority willing to do the bidding of a certain kingdom or two in the Middle East) is a chapter of national shame. It's inevitable that an orgy of this kind and the necessary disregard for our laws, heritage, and national morality would foster the kind of disrespect for those values not just among the ones benefiting themselves by ignoring them but among those of us who saw it happen without any consequences for the malefactors. Old Yiddish saying: 'A fisch rats fun de kop' (A fish rots from the head). True dat.

The decline of education and a free press- The unionization of America's school teachers and the penetration of those unions was a primary goal of the Comintern, the subversive organization the Soviets set up to promote their revolution world wide by infiltrating key western institutions. As David Horowitz chronicles in his memoir, Radical Son, by the 1950's the teacher's unions in many large cities had been thoroughly penetrated by communists 'under party discipline.' This was one of the factors, along with the popularity in sections of academe of Franz Boa's ideas on deconstructionism (facts can be manipulated to fit your political ideology) were factors that contributed to what amounted to our own Cultural Revolution in the1960's. And of course, after the anti-war movement faded out once President Nixon ended the draft, many of the movement's radical leaders became tenured professors in our universities. Including in our journalism schools, where the example of Woodward and Bernstein's fame and fortune after Watergate gave rise to the normalization of 'advocacy journalism.'

The deliberate division of Americans into groups and the pitting them against each other - This has been divide and rule on steroids. While the Democrats with their emphasis on identity politics have been the most guilty, the Republicans have played their own part in this. It has encouraged people to think of themselves as members of a group with a label and a party rather than as Americans.

So, how do we fix it?

First, we have to realize that it has to be fixed. The alternatives are either national disintegration via secession or our very own Julius Caesar and the end of our Republic.

Second, we have to realize that the decay has been working for some time, and it will take some time to fix it. And that fixing it may involve using some of the means involved in causing that decay in reverse.

We need leadership with courage, empathy, common sense and the knowledge of what it takes to get things done efficiently. The only candidate I see out there with those qualities is Donald Trump. He has one major drawback, that as an insurgent, he will be fought tooth and nail on any reforms by the members of the uniparty in congress, including some of those whom he defeated during the primaries unwilling to put aside their petty grievances for the good of the country. If that happens, a President Trump might need to use things like executive orders or leaning heavily on a GOP senate majority leader to invoke the nuclear option unless we, the People, rise up and let our representatives know in no uncertain terms that their jobs are on the line. As much as I hate the precedent being set, desperate times sometimes call for desperate measures.

Education can be reformed, but it must be from the bottom up. Governor Scott Walker proved that the teacher's unions can be defeated, a necessary first step. The ideas of school choice and vouchers are also an excellent first step, as is abolishing Common Core and turning education back to the states. The problem is that many of these states embrace radical, leftist ideals and allowing them to control public education merely exacerbates the problem. A number of California's textbooks in these areas are to the left of Stalin. Far better to have a new, restaffed Federal Department of Education write up guidelines that mandate curriculum at least for history, civics and social studies along with federal approval of textbooks in those subjects to make sure they comply and have patriotic content that teaches America's greatness rather than the quasi-socialist drivel too many of them contain now. I hate like the plague using the feds for this, but there isn't any other way. And if we are going to contribute federal money to public schools, we may as well use that leverage.
Just as G-d saw to it the the Hebrews wandered in the desert for forty years to rid themselves of the slave mentality, we will need to play the long game to rid our children of indoctrination and allow a new generation to emerge with proper and patriotic values.

Federal encouragement of home schooling wouldn't be a bad idea either. And so would federally sponsored online degree programs that allow students to get a college education at a fraction of the cost and with none of the indoctrination factor of many of today's brick and mortar universities.

It is vitally important to end the divisive splitting of Americans into groups and encourage us again to think of ourselves as one nation. again, Donald Trump has been the only candidate to make a point of constantly mentioning this in his stump speeches.

And finally, nothing unites Americans like a common threat, or an attack like 9/11.The last time this happened, we had mediocre leadership with a strong personal interest in protecting the complicit guilty parties. If such a thing happens again, G-d forbid, and we have leadership actually willing to lead us instead of lying to us, it would be a strong and enduring unifying factor.

Well, there you have it.

Make sure to drop by every Monday for the WoW! Magazine Forum. And enjoy WoW! Magazine 24-7 with some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere. Take from me, you won't want to miss it.

Sunday, September 18, 2016

Elizabeth Warren is something of a villain to a lot of progressives these days and it has nothing to do with her lying about her 'native American' background to get a lucrative position at Harvard.

For all her nonsense about wanting to get Wall Street money out of politics, when it came down to it she endorsed Crooked Hillary, the candidate backed by sleazy Wall Street money instead of her political soulmate, Bernie Sanders. Even worse, after selling herself in hopes of being named Hillary's running mate, Hillary picked Tim Kaine and she's been reduced to shilling for Hillary in hopes of getting some kind of cabinet post.

In that role,Senator Warren appeared for Hillary at Ohio State University. But then (H/T, Legal Insurrection) a pro-Trump student used the opportunity of taking a selfie to ask a few questions and hilarity ensued:

Student:“How does it feel like losing to Trump this year?”

Warren: “We’re not going to lose to trump this year.”

Student: “Oh really!”

Warren: “We’re going to beat that [inaudible]”

Student: “But you lied about your ethnicity, you lied about your ethnicity to get a scholarship.”

Warren: [runs away]

Of course, it was a teaching job (one class, $400,000 per year) that Warren finagled with her misrepresentation of her ethnic background rather than a scholarship, but yeah, that's the truth of the matter.

Ruthie, who has Down's Syndrome, fell about a year ago. Complicated lumbar spinal fusion surgery was done which used screws to connect her skull and chest but the resulting pressure on her spine caused her to stop walking and she also lost the function of her hands.

Dr. Josh Schroder, a senior orthopedist at Hadassah Medical Center said, "Ruthie had a life-threatening condition when she came to Hadassah for treatment."

"It was clear that she required immediate surgery. I contacted the head of the spinal surgery unit at Hadassah, Dr. Leon Kaplan, in order to draw up a plan for the complicated operation."

The group of specialists decided on surgery in stages on the anterior and posterior areas of Ruthy's neck, performed by Dr. Schroder, Dr. Leon Kaplan, Dr. Moni Benifla, a pediatric neurosurgeon, Dr. Menahem Gross, a pediatric ENT specialist and a group of senior anesthesiologists.

"The last time an operation like this was performed was by Prof. Kaplan himself, the only person who does such surgery in Israel," said Dr. Schroder. "During the surgery we cut away the upper part of the spine and released the previous fusion in order to free the posterior vertebrae. We then performed a new fusion. Spinal surgery on such a narrow spine is very dangerous and sensitive and requires precise and meticulous work."

Schroder says that "This is a very rare case. Only due to the capabilities of the multifaceted team we managed to find a solution. Ruthie is now walking and has even strengthened her walking at the Alyn rehabilitation hospital. Her hands function perfectly and she is proving that everything could now be possible for her."

Ruthy's father Pinny said that "We received a new child. I want to thank first and foremost the Creator of the World who guided the doctors, headed by Josh Schroder, to find a cure for our Ruthie." He added that "They succeeded in doing the unthinkable.With G-d's help and with the help of the doctors, my daughter is walking on her feet and that is an unforgettable experience for us."

It's been proven that the United States made at least two separate payments to the Iranian government via wire transfer within the last 14 months, a Treasury Department spokesman admitted Saturday. So President Barack Obama was not telling the truth when he said that such payments were impossible.

This proves that the president knowingly lied, that the payments in cash were open appeasement to Iran as well as ransom for hostages, and constituted outright felony money laundering.

Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) discovered the two wire transfer payments during briefings with Obama administration officials.

At an August 4, 2016 press conference about a $400 million payment delivered in cash to the Iranian government that coincided exactly with the release of hostages Iran was holding, Obama said, “The reason that we had to give them cash is precisely because we are so strict in maintaining sanctions and we do not have a banking relationship with Iran that we couldn't send them a check and we could not wire the money.”

But a Treasury Department spokesman has now revealed that on at least two occasions, the U.S. did make payments to the Iranian government using wire transfers.

In July 2015, the U.S. government paid the Islamic republic $848,000 over a claim over architectural drawings and fossils that are now housed in Iran. Isn't it nice that our president is so scrupulous about paying Iranian claims when he won't allow U.S. citizens to sue Iran in our courts for damages? The second payment was made in April 2016,when the U.S. wired Iran $9 million to remove 32 metric tons of its heavy water from the Arak heavy water plant which is used to produce plutonium that can be used to make nuclear weapons:

The Treasury Department spokesman explained that the lifting of those sanctions allowed Iran “to gain incremental access to the international financial system, which opened up more options for executing transactions, such as the heavy water transaction” that occurred in April 2016. The spokesman declined to offer an explanation as to why the July 2015 payment was possible despite the full array of sanctions in place at the time.

Actually, both these payments violated sanctions still in place based on Iran's human rights abuses. The July 2015 payment was made while both human rights and nuclear-related sanctions were still in place, while the April 2016 payment was made while the human rights sanctions were in place.

That $400 million cash payment that Obama said could not have been delivered except in cash was part of a larger $1.7 billion settlement with Iran, the remainder of which was also delivered in cash. The president also claimed that the $400 million wasn't a ransom, but was paid to settle a dispute over military equipment ordered by the shah of Iran before the Ayatollahs took over.

The normal procedure is that the contracts are signed and the consignee (the purchasing country) goes to a large bank and obtains a Letter of Credit in the amount required. A Letter of Credit is a guarantee from a bank on behalf of one of its customers (in this case, Iran) to the seller's bank that the seller (in this case, the U.S.) will be paid in full to the amount of the Letter of Credit as long as the contracted goods and services are delivered.

To restate this more simply, the buyer's bank guarantees payment (normally they have the funds on hold) to the seller's bank when the buyer receive what they ordered.
Since, as President Obama told us, the arms were never shipped to the Ayatollahs, the money was never released to America by Iran's bank either.

So yes, that $400,000,000, was ransom money. And our president lied once again, without being challenged by a servile press.

And the reason it was released in cash? Simple...the Ayatollahs wanted a huge, physical amount of cash to photograph and humiliate America for propaganda purposes. Also, cash is fungible and easier to use without a paper trail to trace it. This was money laundering, plain and simple. And that is a felony.